Now the Hawks scattered, breaking into a hun-dred little groups, their purpose accomplished.
Tarma managed to get to Kethry's side, and the two of them plowed their way back through the burning wreckage of the baggage train.
Iron-shod hooves pounding, their mounts raced as if they'd been harnessed side by side. Kethry clung grimly to the pommel of her saddle, as her partner could see out of the corner of her eye. She was not the horsewoman that the Shin'a'in was, she well knew it, and Hellsbane was galloping erratically; moving far too unpredictably for her to draw Need. At this point she was well-nigh helpless; it would be up to Tarma and the battlemares to protect her.
An over-brave pikeman rose up out of the smoke before them, thinking to hook Tarma from her seat. She ducked beneath his pole arm, and Ironheart trampled him into the red-stained mud. Another footman made a try for Kethry, but Hellsbane snapped at him, crushed his shoulder in her strong teeth, shook him like a dog with a rag while he shrieked, then dropped him again. A rider who thought to intercept them had the trick Tarma and Ironheart had played on Duke Greyhame's sentry performed on him and his steed -- only in deadly earnest. Ironheart reared, screaming challenge, and crow-hopped forward. The gelding the enemy rode backed in panic from the slashing hooves, and as they passed him, his rider's head was kicked in before they could get out of range.
The battlesteeds kited through the smoke and flames of the burning camp with no more fear of either than of the scrubby shrubbery. Three times Tarma turned in her saddle and let fly one of the lethal little arrows of the Shin'a'in -- as those pursuing found to their grief, armor was of little use when an archer could find and target a helmet.
Then shouting began behind them; their pursuers pulled up, looked back -- and began belatedly to return to their battleline. Too late-for Lord Shoveral had made his rare badger's charge -- and had taken full advantage of the hole that the work of the Sunhawks had left in Kelcrag's lines. Kelcrag's forces were trapped between Shoveral and the shale cliffs, with nowhere to retreat.
Using her knees, Tarma signaled Ironheart to slow, and Hellsbane followed her stablemate's lead.
Tarma couldn't make out much through the blowing smoke, but what she could see told her all she needed to know. Kelcrag's banner was down, and there was a milling mass of men -- mostly wearing Leamount's scarlet surcoats -- where it had once stood. All over the field, fighters in Kelcrag's blue were throwing down their weapons.
The civil war was over.
* * *
Kethry touched the tip of her index finger to a spot directly between the sweating fighter's eyebrows; he promptly shuddered once, his eyes rolled up into his head, and he sagged into the waiting arms of his shieldbrother.
"Lay him out there -- that's right -- " Rethaire directed the disposition of the now-slumbering Hawk.
His partner eased him down slowly, stretching him out on his back on a horseblanket, with his wounded arm practically in the herbalist's lap. Rethaire nodded. " -- good. Keth -- "
Kethry blinked, coughed once, and shook her head a little. "Who's next?" she asked.
"Bluecoat."
Kethry stared askance at him. A Bluecoat? One of Kelcrag's people?
Rethaire frowned. "No, don't look at me that way, he's under Mercenary's Truce; he's all right or I wouldn't have let him in here. He's one of Devaril's Demons."
"Ah." The Demons had a good reputation among the companies, even if most of Devaril's meetings with Idra generally ended up as shouting matches. Too bad they'd been on opposite sides in this campaign.
Rethaire finished dusting the long, oozing slash in their companion's arm with blue-green powder, and began carefully sewing it up with silk thread. "Well, are you going to sit there all day?"
"Right, I'm on it," she replied, getting herself to her feet. "Who's with him?"
"My apprentice. Dee. The short one."
Kethry pushed sweat-soaked hair out of her eyes,and tried once again to get it all confined in a tail while she glanced around the space outside the infirmary tent, looking for the green-clad, chubby figure of Rethaire's youngest apprentice. She resolutely shut out the sounds of pain and the smell of sickness and blood; she kept telling herself that this was not as bad as it could have been. The worst casualties were under cover of the tent; those out here were the ones that would be walking (or limping) back to their own quarters when they woke up from Rethaire's drugs or Kethry's spell. They were all just lucky that it was still only overcast and not raining. Sun would have baked them all into heatstroke. Rain ... best not think about fever and pneumonia.
With no prospect of further combat, Kethry was no longer hoarding her magical energies, either personal or garnered from elsewhere, but the only useful spell she had when it came to healing wounds like these was the one that induced instant slumber. So that was her job; put the patients out, while Rethaire or his assistants sewed and splinted them back together again.
Poor Jiles and Oreden didn't even have that much to do; although as Low Magick practitioners they did have Healing abilities, they'd long since exhausted their powers, and now were acting as plain, nonmagical attendants to Tresti. That was what was bad about a late-fall campaign for them; with most of the land going into winter slumber, there was very little ambient energy for a user of Low Magick to pull on.
Tarma was out with Jodi and a few of Leamount's farriers, salvaging what horses they could, and killing the ones too far gone to save. And, sometimes, performing the same office for a human or two.
Kethry shuddered, and wiped the back of her hand across her damp forehead, frowning when she looked at it and saw how filthy it was.
Thank the gods that stuff of Rethaire's prevents infection, or we'd lose half the wounded. We've lost too many as it is. That last sortie had cost the Sunhawks dearly; they were down to two hundred. Fifty were dead, three times that were wounded. Virtually everyone had lost a friend; the uninjured were tending wounded companions.
But it could have been so much worse -- so very much worse.
She finally spotted apprentice Dee, and picked her way through the prone and sleeping bodies to get to his side.
"Great good gods! Why is he out here?" she exclaimed, seeing the patient. He was half-propped on a saddle; stretched out before him was his wounded leg. Kethry nearly gagged at the sight of the blood-drenched leg of his breeches, the man-gled muscles, and the tourniquet practically at his groin.
"Looks worse than it is, Keth." Dee didn't even look up. "More torn up than anything; didn't touch the big vein at all. He don't need Tresti, just you and me." His clever hands were busy cutting bits of the man's breeches away, while the mercenary bit his lip until it, too, bled; hoping to keep from crying out.
"What in hell got you, friend?" Kethry asked, kneeling down at the man's side. She had to have his attention, or the spell wouldn't work. The man was white under his sunburn, his black beard matted with dirt and sweat, the pupils of his eyes wide with pain.
"Some-shit!-big wolf. Had m' bow all trained on yer back, m'lady. Bastard come outa nowhere n' took out m'leg. Should'a known better'n t' sight on a Hawk; 'specially since I knew 'bout you havin' that beast."